Wireless communication systems have become ubiquitous in society. Business and consumers use a wide variety of fixed and mobile wireless terminals, including cell phones, pagers, Personal Communication Services (PCS) systems, and fixed wireless access devices (i.e., vending machine with cellular capability). Wireless service providers continually try to create new markets for wireless devices and expand existing markets by making wireless devices and services cheaper and more reliable. The price of wireless devices has decreased to the point where these devices are affordable to nearly everyone and the price of a wireless device is only a small part of the total cost to the user (i.e., subscriber). To continue to attract new customers, wireless service providers are implementing new services, especially digital data services that, for example, enable a user to browse the Internet and to send and receive e-mail.
Earlier code division multiple access (CDMA) networks, such as IS-95 networks, carried only a very small amount of data traffic. However, third generation wireless networks, such as IS-2000 (also called CDMA2000), are designed to carry much heavier loads of data traffic. IS-2000 networks are capable of efficiently providing both high-speed data services and voice traffic. Still other networks, such as 1xEV-DO networks, are primarily data systems. These types of networks, if used for both voice and data, typically carry voice on an adjacent channel to data traffic. However, IS-2000 networks (i.e., Release C of CDMA2000) carry voice and data on the same carrier.
One important feature of IS-2000 networks (EV-DV—Release C) is the use of a Forward Packet Data channel (F-PDCH) and a Forward Supplemental channel (F-SCH) that are capable of transmitting voice and data traffic from a network base station to a wireless terminal (or mobile station). The F-SCH normally carries data traffic and the F-PDCH usually carries voice traffic. The F-SCH may be flexibly allocated to different subscribers, as data services are needed, thereby conserving the bandwidth resources of a base station.
Data broadcast services (or multicast services) are examples of new services that wireless providers are implementing in wireless networks, including IS-2000 networks. These services may provide a very large market for the anemic data market. AS a result, broadcast (or multicast) service is expected to become a very prominent feature for the next release of wireless standards. In a data broadcast (or multicast), the same information (e.g., sports scores, weather reports, news, and the like) is transmitted to all (or at least a plurality) of the wireless terminals (or mobile stations) in the coverage area of a wireless network base station.
For the sake of simplifying the descriptions that follow, the term “broadcast service” may be used hereafter to refer to both a broadcast service and a multicast service, except as otherwise noted or where both terms are explicitly used.
Qualcomm has proposed using new, dedicated channels in wireless networks to perform broadcast services. However, using dedicated channels for broadcast and/or multicast services reduces the amount of available network resources. In any wireless system (CDMA, TDMA, GSM, or the like), a fixed number of resources (i.e., radio channels, time slots, etc.) are available for communicating with mobile stations. Therefore, using a dedicated resource for broadcast and/or multicast services reduces the number of resources available for conventional voice and data services, even if the broadcast and/or multicast services are lightly used or not used at all.
Therefore, there is a need in the art for improved systems and methods of performing broadcast services and multicast services in a wireless network. In particular, there is a need for wireless network technology that does not use dedicated resources to perform broadcast services and multicast services.